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Thursday, 26 January 2017

As inimical as Dear Leader is to journalists, it’s a strange irony that his propaganda juggernaut and message point-man are dyed in the wool muckrakers—with parallels to another paradox we’ve explored previously but not quite a one-to-one correspondence but still a strained relation to the press, and that engine is of course looking to expand into other potentially contentious campaigns.With elections looming in France, Italy and Germany in the upcoming months, media outlets have focused their attention on questions of refugee policies, trade and national sovereignty and seem determine to sway public opinion. Unabashed moves on the part of the official apparatus and media label—in all its tabloid reputation—to install itself in Germany especially highlights the dissonance of selective concern and the pledge for isolationism without introspection. There are of course two dialogues occurring at the same time—one in the native language and the other in English and not necessarily mutually intelligible or bi-curious, and not always having the access and wherewithal to guide the outside discussion puts German voters perhaps at a disadvantage and subject to a great deal of outside pressure and bullying. Respected German journalism eschews in general sensationalism and practises a restraint that can be to an Anglo-Saxon readership frustratingly staid and boring, and whether Germans have a privileged perspective of what fake-news or die Lügenpresse can lead to and have an innate resistance to it or are just loathe to acknowledge it remains to be seen and might soon be tested again. Reliance on exaggeration can only up to a point produce reliable results and the press is charged with keeping those in power accountable.